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Mitch Lasky, a former senior exec at EA, has pulled up EA boss John Riccitiello on what he says is a "bankrupt strategy".
Lasky starts off saying recent EA financial shortfalls "could hardly have come as a surprise". He goes on: "While Activision was setting sales records with Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, EA had no major hits.
"EA's sports business has been hamstrung by vastly increased licensing costs and failure to transition to a subscription/variable pricing model. This has substantially reduced the profitability of a business that EA used to rely on to fund other, riskier bets," added Lasky.
"But by far the greatest failure of Riccitiello's strategy has been the EA Games division. JR bet his tenure on EA's ability to 'grow their way through the transition' to digital/online with hit packaged goods titles," he went on to say.
"It's been a very ugly scene, indeed. From Spore, to Dead Space, to Mirror's Edge, to Need for Speed: Undercover, it's been one expensive commercial disappointment for EA Games after another. Not to mention the shut-down of Pandemic, half of the justification for EA's $850MM acquisition of Bioware-Pandemic. And don't think that Dante's Inferno, or Knights of the Old Republic, is going to make it all better. It's a bankrupt strategy."
Pulling no punches, Lasky went on to say: "With EA's enterprise value down below $4 billion, it's remarkable that nobody has stepped in to put them out of their misery with an acquisition," citing Disney and Chinese companies like TenCent that could "swallow EA whole".
"It's equally amazing that the board continues to support the existing management team through this debacle. Since JR took over, the company has destroyed over $11 billion in market value." Ouch.
So basically he's saying since ricitellio has been in charge EA has taken more risks and made some worthwhile games instead of just the same old licensed franchises getting a yearly installment ... year after year after year.
A publisher such as EA can take losses on the aforementioned titles (which are far from failures from an objective standpoint, BTW, maybe not so much from a stockholder/investor projection viewpoint but I digress), it's moves such as the Bioware/Pandemic acquisition the ones that pose some real danger.
Very interesting for a bunch of companies. I wonder if Mirror's edge 2 will eliminate the guns and be more of a platformer or add more guns or be the same but add something else into the mix. I really want the first option but I think that's least likely.
you should read that edge article I linked to ( in the cel shading thread I think) basically about what a great game POP sands of time was and how the sequel fucked up in everything except sales. ( a bitter pill to swallow for me) I think that will be what happens...
This is so cute, a promo PR kit for DS game Hercule, with mini-Trojan horse.
Yes, Hercule.
And what is the connection between Hercules and the Trojan Horse again?
edit: in case the irony is not obvious enough there is none. at least not in greek mythology
Did we not discuss this in the first Euro cast? That Hercules wanted to go to Troy, but then turned back.
no, i mispoke if i said that. hercules wanted to go on the Argo to help Jason fetch the Golden Fleece but he had to stay back because he was so badass the ship wouldn't move.
i'm pretty sure he does not feature in any way what so ever in the iliad
PlayStation 2 333.2K PlayStation 3 1.36M PSP 654.7K Xbox 360 1.31M Wii 3.81M Nintendo DS 3.31M
NEW SUPER MARIO BROS. WII WII NINTENDO OF AMERICA Nov-09 2.82M WII FIT PLUS* WII NINTENDO OF AMERICA Oct-09 2.41M WII SPORTS RESORT W/ WII MOTION PLUS* WII NINTENDO OF AMERICA Jul-09 1.79M CALL OF DUTY: MODERN WARFARE 2* 360 ACTIVISION BLIZZARD Nov-09 1.63M CALL OF DUTY: MODERN WARFARE 2* PS3 ACTIVISION BLIZZARD Nov-09 1.12M WII PLAY W/ REMOTE WII NINTENDO OF AMERICA Feb-07 1.01M MARIO KART W/ WHEEL WII NINTENDO OF AMERICA Apr-08 936.1K ASSASSIN'S CREED II 360 UBISOFT Nov-09 783.1K LEFT 4 DEAD 2 360 ELECTRONIC ARTS Nov-09 728.5K MARIO & LUIGI: BOWSER'S INSIDE STORY NDS NINTENDO OF AMERICA Sep-09 656.7K
Holy crap at the Wii, Holy crap at the DS, Holy crap at Mario, Wii Fit Plus and Wii Sports Resort. Just holy crap.
So he's now double lame.
Yeah but at least he looks good, right? That has to count for something.
Lasky starts off saying recent EA financial shortfalls "could hardly have come as a surprise". He goes on: "While Activision was setting sales records with Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, EA had no major hits.
"EA's sports business has been hamstrung by vastly increased licensing costs and failure to transition to a subscription/variable pricing model. This has substantially reduced the profitability of a business that EA used to rely on to fund other, riskier bets," added Lasky.
"But by far the greatest failure of Riccitiello's strategy has been the EA Games division. JR bet his tenure on EA's ability to 'grow their way through the transition' to digital/online with hit packaged goods titles," he went on to say.
"It's been a very ugly scene, indeed. From Spore, to Dead Space, to Mirror's Edge, to Need for Speed: Undercover, it's been one expensive commercial disappointment for EA Games after another. Not to mention the shut-down of Pandemic, half of the justification for EA's $850MM acquisition of Bioware-Pandemic. And don't think that Dante's Inferno, or Knights of the Old Republic, is going to make it all better. It's a bankrupt strategy."
Pulling no punches, Lasky went on to say: "With EA's enterprise value down below $4 billion, it's remarkable that nobody has stepped in to put them out of their misery with an acquisition," citing Disney and Chinese companies like TenCent that could "swallow EA whole".
"It's equally amazing that the board continues to support the existing management team through this debacle. Since JR took over, the company has destroyed over $11 billion in market value." Ouch.
There's more on Lasky's blog (thanks MCV).
Bad for the suits, good for the gamers
___
Listen to Wu-Tang and watch Kung-Fu
It will add guns. And boobies.
And violence. And sweet pert fem-ass.
you should read that edge article I linked to ( in the cel shading thread I think) basically about what a great game POP sands of time was and how the sequel fucked up in everything except sales. ( a bitter pill to swallow for me) I think that will be what happens...
This is so cute, a promo PR kit for DS game Hercule, with mini-Trojan horse.
Yes, Hercule.
And what is the connection between Hercules and the Trojan Horse again?
edit: in case the irony is not obvious enough there is none. at least not in greek mythology
___
Listen to Wu-Tang and watch Kung-Fu
Did we not discuss this in the first Euro cast? That Hercules wanted to go to Troy, but then turned back.
no, i mispoke if i said that. hercules wanted to go on the Argo to help Jason fetch the Golden Fleece but he had to stay back because he was so badass the ship wouldn't move.
i'm pretty sure he does not feature in any way what so ever in the iliad
___
Listen to Wu-Tang and watch Kung-Fu
Well we have a good topic for the podcast.
Not quite, one of the big reason for their troubles is the acquisition of Bioware and Pandemic. The latter was a big waste.
Holy mother of God
NPD numbers
PlayStation 2 333.2K
PlayStation 3 1.36M
PSP 654.7K
Xbox 360 1.31M
Wii 3.81M
Nintendo DS 3.31M
NEW SUPER MARIO BROS. WII WII NINTENDO OF AMERICA Nov-09 2.82M
WII FIT PLUS* WII NINTENDO OF AMERICA Oct-09 2.41M
WII SPORTS RESORT W/ WII MOTION PLUS* WII NINTENDO OF AMERICA Jul-09 1.79M
CALL OF DUTY: MODERN WARFARE 2* 360 ACTIVISION BLIZZARD Nov-09 1.63M
CALL OF DUTY: MODERN WARFARE 2* PS3 ACTIVISION BLIZZARD Nov-09 1.12M
WII PLAY W/ REMOTE WII NINTENDO OF AMERICA Feb-07 1.01M
MARIO KART W/ WHEEL WII NINTENDO OF AMERICA Apr-08 936.1K
ASSASSIN'S CREED II 360 UBISOFT Nov-09 783.1K
LEFT 4 DEAD 2 360 ELECTRONIC ARTS Nov-09 728.5K
MARIO & LUIGI: BOWSER'S INSIDE STORY NDS NINTENDO OF AMERICA Sep-09 656.7K
Holy crap at the Wii, Holy crap at the DS, Holy crap at Mario, Wii Fit Plus and Wii Sports Resort. Just holy crap.
Wii - 2.15 million
NDS - 3.04 million
X360 - 1.44 million
PS3 - 726,000
PSP - 1.02 million
PS2 - 410,000
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Tell me to get back to rewriting this site so it's not horrible on mobile